The making of a postliberal: Formed and reformed

Sitting on the four corners of an intersection in the town where I grew up are the public school, the library, the town hall and my home church. Every morning an American flag is raised in front of each of the four buildings. The church, however, sits on a hill above the other public buildings, as if presiding over all of them. The church is built of stone, and its sturdy Norman architecture seems to rise out of the massive rock formations that mark the earth throughout the town. To this day, when I sing "The Church's One Foundation," or hear reference to Peter as "the rock" on which Jesus will build his church, I think of that building.

My father was the senior minister of the church. When he looked out the window of his study, he could survey the town as if it were all his parish, and in a sense it was: the church membership included over a third of the town's population.